


A Long Separation

by dramatic owl (snarky_panda)



Category: Hey Arnold!
Genre: Alternate Universe, Community: Ladies Bingo 2013, Drama, Female Friendship, Gen, Trope Bingo Amnesty, prompt: another year older: birthdays, trope: au: historical
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-15
Updated: 2013-10-15
Packaged: 2017-12-29 11:26:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1004880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/snarky_panda/pseuds/dramatic%20owl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Historical AU. They were both ten years old when the war came home.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Long Separation

**Author's Note:**

> Written for DW's ladiesbingo challenge, prompt: another year older: birthdays and DW's trope_bingo challenge, trope: au: historical. Disclaimer: None of it belongs to me. Just this story.
> 
> Many, many thanks to [cecilegrey](http://archiveofourown.org/users/cecilegrey/pseuds/cecilegrey) for beta-reading.
> 
> Content note: deals with racism and xenophobia of the time period.

Taking advantage of the commotion that Arnold's grandmother had caused, Helga Pataki ran across the street to the third in a line of buses parked along the opposite curb. She could see Phoebe's Aunt Midori sitting beside the street-side window halfway back. Her cousin David sat in the row behind them.

Midori Heyerdahl turned when Helga reached up and rapped gently on the glass then stepped back so the woman could see her. There was shifting inside and then Phoebe came into view, her face a mask of sadness and apprehension. When she saw Helga she managed a smile and opened the window, sticking her head out so they could talk. Helga tried to return the smile, but her own face felt stiff, as if it would crack, and tears welled up in her eyes despite her efforts for control.

"Arnold's grandma is trying to stall things," she informed her, unable to get any other words past the lump in her throat.

Phoebe nodded in understanding. In all of Hillwood nobody was more outspoken against the exclusion order and the forced evacuations than Arnold and both his grandparents, though Grandma 'Pookie' employed more extreme methods sometimes. Arnold was standing on the sidewalk across the street with a small group of people, all of them holding signs and chanting protests.

What a fool old Football Head was; a naïve starry-eyed fool fighting a hopeless battle. But Helga loved him more than ever for standing up for her best friend and all the other families who were being ordered to leave. Not that she'd ever let anyone know it, especially Arnold.

Behind the cluster of demonstrators was the large brick building that served as headquarters for all the salvaging operations in Hillwood – people brought in scrap metal, paper and any other materials that were needed for the war effort. The front window prominently displayed a poster quoting the hook from FDR's Chat 19: _We are now in this war. We are all in it – all the way. Every single man, woman and child is a partner in the most tremendous undertaking of our American history. We must share together the bad news and the good news, the defeats and the victories - the changing fortunes of war._

It was an odd juxtaposition, she thought.

"Pookie, get out from under there!" Arnold's grandpa Phil was hollering from the curb.

The feisty grey-haired woman had thrown herself on the ground right under the wheels of the first bus and would not be moved, determined to stop the entire fleet of Greyhounds from going forward. Unfortunately her strategy didn't hold things up for long.

"Crazy old bird," Phil grumbled and threw up his hands in resignation as four military policemen lifted his wife off the ground and led her away.

"Hey," another policeman who was walking down the line of buses called out to Helga. "Get away from the bus, little girl. You shouldn't be standing in the street like that."

"Ahhh, hold your horses, Flatfoot," she retorted disdainfully, but not until he was out of earshot. Big Bob would flip if she got arrested for yelling back at a policeman. "I'm saying goodbye to my friend."

"I'll write as soon as I can, Helga."

Phoebe reached down, holding her hand out. Helga grasped it tightly, gave it a squeeze, then let go and returned to the sidewalk across the way. She stood exactly in line with her friend's window so she would know she was there until the moment the bus left.

#

Helga and Phoebe had known each other since preschool but they didn't become good friends until the third grade. Most people shunned Phoebe. She got better grades than anyone. She wore large glasses that seemed to cover half her face. And she was Japanese. Big Bob Pataki had a fit when he learned there was a Japanese girl in her class and his rants were never-ending. There was no law in this state that required Japanese children to attend segregated schools like there was in California. For the most part Helga let his screeds go in one ear and out the other. Miriam Pataki would tiredly agree with him and go into the kitchen to pour herself more coffee. Judging from her expression Helga got the sense that her mother wasn't actually agreeing, and might even have disagreed; she simply didn't want to hear it.

She wasn't sure what made her offer friendship to her mousy but brilliant classmate. Maybe it was to spite Big Bob. Or maybe it was a conviction that her father was a blustering fool so whatever he said and thought had to be wrong. Maybe it was because she knew what it was like to be terribly lonely. And maybe it was a little of all three. Whatever the reason she was glad she'd made the overture. Phoebe was one of the sweetest people she'd ever known. She became a caring and loyal friend who could keep a secret safe. Helga had never told a soul about how she felt about Arnold, including him; that was her deepest secret. Early in their friendship she realized that Phoebe already knew. She'd never let on though, and she never repeated it to anyone.

Big Bob had of course made his sentiments clear after the first time she invited her new friend home from school. In school the other kids, except for Arnold, looked at her askance – and so did Phoebe's family. They were happy that Phoebe had a friend now, for she'd been lonely for a long time; at the same time they were wary. Still, the Heyerdahls graciously invited her into their home and were very kind to her.

Sometimes, even after they'd been friends for a long time, Helga thought about how maybe she'd befriended Phoebe at least partly to spite Big Bob and felt ashamed.

Phoebe's father Kyo, her grandfather and her cousin David were sitting in the living room listening to the radio the first time she went over to their house. Phoebe introduced her to them then she brought her to the kitchen to meet her Aunt Midori, who offered them a snack. They both declined and went up to Phoebe's room so they could do their homework and talk.

Walking through the house Helga noticed all the incredibly beautiful paintings hanging on the walls, all scenes from nature. There were several settings of flowering trees and different colored blossoms, elegant black and white mountain landscapes, birds perched delicately on branches. Some of the pictures had horizontal lines of Japanese characters next to the scene.

"You've really got a lot of beautiful pictures in your house," she remarked, walking over to a canvas filled with lovely pale pink blossoms hanging on the wall at the far end of the upstairs hallway.

"My mother was an artist. She painted them. She painted scrolls, too, but those are too fragile to mount on the wall. We keep those in boxes. I take them out to look at them sometimes, but then I have to put them away. Air breaks down the paint too easily." Phoebe came up to stand beside her. "I love the cherry blossoms best." She reached up and tenderly ran her fingers along the edge of the frame. "This one is my favorite."

"She was really talented," Helga answered quietly, not knowing what else to say.

"Yes, she was. She wrote the haikus, too. Poems," she clarified when Helga looked at her blankly. She paused then gestured back to a doorway they'd passed and said, "My room is back there."

Helga took the hint and followed Phoebe into her room. Her attention was immediately drawn to the photos tucked into the frame on both sides of the mirror above her dresser. She recognized the faces of the family members she'd just met as well as Phoebe when she was younger. There was only one person she didn't recognize and she guessed that woman to be Phoebe's mother; in almost every photo she appeared with Kyo, or Kyo and Phoebe.

She turned away from the collage of photos and went to join her friend, who was already sprawled on the area rug on the floor, setting up the flashcards so they could work on their spelling and vocabulary.

There were many afternoons spent this way, their studying punctuated with conversations about their families, which movies and actors they liked, what they wanted to be when they grew up. They took breaks between studying and listened to music or played games. Phoebe taught her how to play _go_ , a Japanese board game of strategy that Helga found intriguing.

Sometimes they went to the Patakis' house, but most of the time they were at the Heyerdahls. Though Helga never expressed the sentiment she preferred going to Phoebe's place. There was a warmer, more peaceful and comfortable atmosphere. The three men were a fixture in the living room, each sitting on the same chair or in the same place on the couch with the radio on. Sometimes they were reading newspapers or playing _go_ or talking with the radio playing in the background. Often they hollered things back at the programs they were listening to, but it was only because they were enthusiastic. They didn't bellow the way Big Bob did. And they called out in two languages, which made it more interesting.

Aunt Midori was usually in the kitchen cooking when they arrived from school, and she always had a snack on hand to offer them when they came in. Helga appreciated that, especially on days when Miriam, in one of her frequent bouts of lethargy and absentmindedness, forgot to pack her lunch or stock up on groceries so she could prepare it for herself.

The irony of it was almost painful at times. Phoebe had lost her mother; and yet she had a better mother in her aunt than Helga had in her own mother.

When the weather was warmer and pleasant they went to the park to play hopscotch or jump rope, but they almost always ended up back at the Heyerdahls' house afterward.

By the fourth grade they'd settled into a warm, easy friendship. They were in class together and in general they were with a nice group of kids, including Arnold. Sometimes they even went along with the others to play stickball in the street or football in the park or to have sodas at the candy store on the corner.

This year they'd returned to school exuberant, excited to be a year older and in the fifth grade. Phoebe had her tenth birthday in early September, just as school started, catching up to Helga who was a few months older. This year would be the best yet; fifth grade was the top grade in the school, they were in the double-digit age group now, and come June they wouldn't be the victims on Trashcan Day, a notorious tradition at P.S. 118 in which the fifth-graders stuffed the fourth-graders into garbage cans after school.

Three months later, in early December, everything changed. The two of them sat in the Heyerdahl home on the landing of the second floor, as still and quiet as they could be, and listened to the adults speak in hushed urgent tones, wondering aloud if America would enter the war now and what would happen to them. The Imperial Japanese Navy had bombed Pearl Harbor that morning.

"We'll have to burn our things," Aunt Midori said sadly. "The fans, the scrolls, anything remotely Japanese, especially anything with writing…"

Beside her Phoebe stifled a gasp. Helga's eyes immediately went to the paintings in the hallway. They all had writing. Even the ones that didn't have poems had her mother's signature in the lower corner, in Japanese characters, including Phoebe's favorite one of the cherry blossoms.

Aunt Midori called to Phoebe to come downstairs a moment later. Helga remained behind, listening to Kyo gently explain to Phoebe that her mother would understand the necessity.

"She would agree that our lives are more important."

Helga quietly walked to the end of the hall and studied the canvas that she'd admired the first time she was there, wondering if maybe there was a way she could save this one for her friend. The adults had said that the houses of all Japanese families would likely be searched. But her family wasn't Japanese. Maybe she could hold it for Phoebe until this was all over. Nobody ever went into the back of her closet, where she hid all the things she wanted to keep secret. She could hide the painting behind her large chewing gum sculpture of Arnold.

She couldn't stay to witness the Heyerdahls burn their things, nor did she have a chance to work out a plan for smuggling that one painting out of the house so she could save it for Phoebe. Aunt Midori remembered she was still there, called her to come downstairs and kindly but firmly told her that it would be best if she went straight home. Disconcerted and disconsolate she left. There was already smoke coming out of the chimney when she passed through the front gate and looked back at the house.

Phoebe didn't return to school that Monday or Tuesday, or the days to come. The Heyerdahls remained in their home, afraid to go out. Only eighteen-year-old David ventured out to work early in the mornings, reasoning that no matter what happened next they would need to have money. On Tuesday evening two uniformed men came to the house for Kyo and his father. Both men had their suitcases packed already; they'd been expecting this. By way of a letter a few weeks later the family learned that they'd been transported to the same internment camp in Idaho, run by the Department of Justice. It was one of the camps for people of Japanese descent who were considered potentially dangerous by the FBI. At least they were together.

Helga went over to see Phoebe after school whenever she could, bringing the assignments that her friend had missed, and news of school and their classmates, of their kind and creative teacher Mr. Simmons, wanting to keep her spirits up. They both continued to talk as if Phoebe was only out of class for just a little while, out with an illness, and that she'd be back soon; even after several weeks had passed and the nasty graffiti began appearing on the white gate that separated the sidewalk from the Heyerdahls' front yard and stoop, even after it became clear that evacuation of Japanese families was no longer voluntary.

In the second week of April, exactly a day after Helga turned eleven, Phoebe broke the news that her family's name and number was posted on the board at the Civil Control Station. She'd found out two days earlier but hadn't wanted to spoil Helga's birthday. The Heyerdahls were scheduled to depart for the Hillwood Valley Racetrack, just south of the city, on April 23rd.

Phoebe told Helga she had something to show her and made her promise to keep it a secret. She shut her bedroom door then knelt down beside the bed, reaching underneath to pull something out. Helga knew what it was before Phoebe revealed the cherry blossom painting. She'd wrapped it carefully in a blanket.

"I hid this one." She bowed her head. "I know it was wrong but I couldn't let them burn it. It's just a painting. How could anyone think there's anything dangerous about it?"

Helga touched her shoulder reassuringly.

"Only…now when we leave…"

"Let me take it, Pheebs. No one will ever look in the back of my closet. I'll keep it safe for you until you get back."

They decided it would be too conspicuous if she walked out with it that afternoon. Late that night, after everyone was asleep, Helga sneaked out and crept back over to the Heyerdahls' house. Phoebe met her on their stoop with the wrapped painting, and Helga took it and brought it home under the cover of darkness.

That morning of Phoebe's scheduled departure, April 23rd, Helga leaped out of bed long before dawn. She threw on her pink cotton dress, shoes and socks, hastily tied her blonde hair up with a pink bow, donned her purple coat and quietly snuck out of the house, carrying a bundle she'd wrapped for her friend. In the cold and damp she rushed through the dark deserted streets to the Heyerdahls' house, where she found Phoebe sitting outside on the front stoop already, her arms hugging her body, the tag with the family's number pinned to her blue coat – number 27109. Tags with the same number would be on their luggage and pinned to Aunt Midori's and David's clothing as well.

Phoebe's dress was blue but she wore the same brown and white saddle shoes and white socks that Helga sported.

"Now is the safest time for me to sit out here," Phoebe said quietly. "No one is out."

Wordlessly Helga took a seat on the step next to her friend and pulled her coat more tightly around her. The two girls sat together in silence, staring up at the pinkish pre-dawn sky. There was nothing to say and too much to say in too little time.

"I couldn't sleep," Phoebe spoke finally, breaking the silence.

"Me, neither."

"I packed paper and pen. I'll write to you as soon as we get there so you know where to contact me."

The Hillwood Valley Racetrack had been hastily converted into an assembly center for the Japanese families in and around Hillwood who were being evacuated. It was enclosed with barbed wire now and guarded by military police, the stables where the horses had been kept served as living units for families. Helga shuddered at the thought of it.

She thrust out the bundle she was holding on her lap. "I heard…with all the cold and the rain…you'll need a pair of warm boots to walk through all that mud…"

Phoebe's eyes glistened as she accepted the package.

"These were your Christmas present, Helga. I can't take them."

She'd already known what it was without opening the wrapper.

But Helga knew they hadn't had time to shop for anything they might need. The past few days had been a whirlwind as the Heyerdahls frantically tried to sell as many of their belongings as they could; they would have to leave most of their stuff behind anyway and they needed whatever money they could earn. Unfortunately what they earned wasn't even close to the actual value of their things; the people who came to buy knew they were desperate. In a few hours, when they had gone, people in the neighborhood would descend on the house and simply take whatever possessions the Heyerdahls couldn't sell or bring with them.

Helga had only heard just yesterday about the muddy racetrack and the damp, draughty living quarters.

"I want you to have them."

"My feet aren't as big as yours."

They both giggled softly when Helga touched the wrapping, indicating that she could fill the empty space in the boots with it. Maybe the paper would help keep her feet warm too.

Phoebe gingerly opened the wrapping, slipped off her saddle shoes and put on the Nancy Spumoni boots.

#

Helga finally received Phoebe's first letter from the Hillwood Valley Racetrack in early June. The envelope had very obviously been opened and resealed, and parts of the letter were blacked out; sentences, sometimes entire paragraphs had been censored. She couldn't imagine what these chuckleheads could find threatening about a letter between two pre-teen girls. It seemed to her that she was surrounded by people who grew stupider with every day that passed.

She tried holding the letter up to the light, hoping to see through the black ink to the words beneath, but neither lamplight nor sunlight worked so she gave up. Taking paper and pen that evening she started her own letter with an apology to Phoebe for the delay in answering.

_We got our first Sugar Book in May_ , Helga wrote, picking a subject that she thought would be common to both of them still. All of America was rationing sugar; she imagined the Japanese families at the Hillwood Valley Racetrack would be, too. _Mr. Simmons handed them out to us in school._

Keeping things as light as possible she went on to write about Mr. Simmons, the other kids in class, everything she used to talk about when she visited Phoebe after school. The next day she stuck the envelope into the mailbox, wondering if they'd censor her letter too, and wondering with a sinking feeling in her stomach how long it would take to get to her friend, _if_ it would get to her.

As the weeks passed her fears seemed to come to fruition. She spent the summer volunteering for the paper drives with the other kids from school, playing softball in the park, checking the mailbox daily. But August came and still she hadn't received another letter from Phoebe.

"She seems really down, Bob," Helga overheard Miriam downstairs in the living room one evening.

"It's nothing. The girl is just high-strung."

"But she's been like this all summer. She misses her friend—"

"Good riddance. She can make other friends."

"Oh, come on, Bee—"

"Aw, pipe down, Miriam. I'm listening to 'The Thin Man'."

Miriam said something else, but she'd lowered her voice enough that Helga couldn't hear the words. A minute later, footsteps sounded on the stairs and Helga leaped off the bed, dashed into her closet, flipped on the light and shut the door. She didn't know why it was suddenly occurring to Miriam that she should act like a mother to her, but she wasn't in the mood.

The chewing gum sculpture of Arnold stared back at her, Yuko Heyerdahl's painting poked out from behind it. She was only sitting there for a short time before she realized how stupid this was. It was August, the closet was stuffy and hot and she needed air. She swiped at the sweat on her face, mopping up the tears that had appeared there too; she didn't even know she'd wanted to cry.

Both Miriam and Big Bob were standing in her bedroom when she pushed the closet door open and tumbled out.

"Yeesh," Bob remarked, shuddering. "What a nut ball. This comes from your side of the family, Miriam."

"Right, Bob," Helga scoffed. "Your side of the family is so obviously mentally healthy—"

"Hey, hey, hey," he threatened. "Don't get fresh with me, little lady."

Having made his authority clear and wanting no part of any heart to heart talk with Helga he left the room, announcing that he was going back downstairs.

"Helga, what were you doing in there?"

"Nothing, Miriam."

"You must have had a reason for being in there. And I wish you wouldn't call me by my first name. I'm your mother."

She heaved an exasperated sigh. "Nothing, Mom."

"I was going to make some lemonade. Wouldn't you like a nice cold glass?"

Helga resisted the urge to roll her eyes at Miriam's sweet tone.

"Come on downstairs, honey."

After a long pause she sighed again and said, "Okay," and got up from the floor.

Big Bob frowned at both of them as they passed through the living room on the way to the kitchen. Helga sat at the table while Miriam mixed up the pitcher of lemonade.

"It's going to be a little more tart than I usually make it," she said, filling two glasses and bringing them to the table. She sat down. "What with the sugar ration and everything."

"I'm sure it's fine," Helga answered, refraining from pointing out that Miriam never made lemonade.

"You seem down, Helga. I thought you were enjoying volunteering for the paper drive this summer."

"It's great," she muttered sarcastically. She took a sip of lemonade and winced, her face screwing up. It was so tart it made her eye twitch, too.

"Honey, I know you miss your friend. Maybe you could write to her."

"I did write to her, in June. She never wrote back."

"It's only two months," she said.

As she sipped her own drink Miriam's face puckered and her eye began to twitch too. Helga might have laughed if she wasn't feeling so low.

"I know that seems like a long time, Helga, but things are different now with America being in the war. Remember when Olga left for England?"

Her older sister Olga was volunteering overseas, helping to boost the morale of the soldiers stationed there.

"We didn't get her first letter until two months after she got there."

"But that letter was coming all the way from overseas. This is only from Hillwood Valley."

"Mail is going to be slower now, even local mail. Coming from a relocation center it will be especially slow. They're making sure there isn't anything suspicious—"

"We're eleven years old! What do people think could be suspicious in our letters? It isn't fair. And Phoebe is American, she was born here."

"I know. I know it, sweetie." Miriam took another drink, screwed up her face then set the glass down and pushed it away. "This is really terrible, isn't it?"

They both began to laugh. When they'd settled down Miriam reached over and patted her hand.

"She's a good friend. If you haven't heard from her yet I'm sure it's because the mail has been delayed or she hasn't had a chance to write, not because anything has happened or she doesn't want to stay in contact with you."

In late August Helga finally received another censored letter. Based on the remaining content before and after the blacked out parts Helga was able to infer that most of Phoebe's specific descriptions of her living conditions had been blotted out.

"That's what they want to keep secret," Helga remarked with disgust.

But the part about the Nancy Spumoni boots was left in. Phoebe told her they were coming in very handy and thanked her again for the precious gift, so Helga knew that it was as cold and muddy there as the rumors said it was. And the place probably smelled bad too, from before when the horses lived there.

To her dismay Phoebe's letter ended with the news that they would be moving further away.

_The Hillwood Valley Racetrack is only a temporary camp. We'll be relocating to a permanent camp soon. I don't know where that will be, but according to the rumors circulating around here (and there are a lot of those all the time) it will be somewhere in the southwest. But I'll write to you as soon as we get there so you have the new address._

School started again in early September and Helga returned with a heavy heart. Though she was friendly with the other kids none of them was really a _friend_ and most of them were a little intimidated by her. As timid as Phoebe could be sometimes she wasn't actually afraid of Helga; she just let her have her way most of the time because she was easy-going and usually didn't care one way or another. Phoebe accepted her exactly the way she was, even the bossy, demanding part.

She missed her terribly.

After four months Helga finally received another letter, the longest delay between letters. The envelope was postmarked from Arizona. Dry heat and dust storms had replaced the humidity and damp cold of Hillwood Valley.

_You should see me,_ Phoebe wrote. _I'm never without a full coating of white dust. You might think I'm a ghost if you saw me._ _Every morning I wake up with grit in my eyes, my mouth, even my ears. I hate the desert._

Like the Hillwood Valley Racetrack their new home was surrounded by barbed wire. That part was censored but Helga could read between the lines. ' _Except for the climate this place is just like the other one'_ meant the same barbed wire, the same crowded conditions.

Phoebe and her family and the other families tried to make the best of it. They met and socialized and played games. They planted victory gardens, just like everyone was doing in Hillwood and everywhere else in the country, only they were trying to grow vegetables in soil and climate that was hostile. But it gave them something to do.

They had contests in the camp too. Garden growing contests, _go_ contests, Haiku contests.

_You would excel at Haiku_ _, Helga_ , Phoebe wrote. _You've always been so good at writing poetry._

Another secret that Phoebe had kept safe for her; none of the other kids and very few adults in her life knew that Helga wrote poetry. Mr. Simmons kindly withheld her name whenever he read her poems aloud in his class, somehow intuiting that she would be mortified if anyone knew she wrote such sappy stuff.

She chuckled a little at Phoebe's lamenting over the fact that there was no school and that the kids ran around aimlessly every day, undisciplined, causing trouble. Phoebe was one of those kids who loved school and was always well-behaved. Thinking of it made Helga quietly cry a little. But when she began to write her letter in response she kept things light again, talking about paper drives and rationing, about their own victory gardens that they were planting, and about Miriam's new job at a factory, filling in while the men were off fighting overseas, and how much happier her mother seemed now that she was working.

Time passed and as Helga continued with her schoolwork, volunteering and taking on more responsibility at home she also anxiously awaited the arrival of each new letter from her friend.

Finally, after two years had come and gone, Phoebe wrote to tell her that she would be returning to Hillwood.

#

Everything about this city block had changed. The poster quoting FDR was no longer in the window of the building that had served as salvaging headquarters. On the other side of the street the Civil Control Station no longer existed; the building had been converted into a real bus depot. Arnold and his group of dissidents weren't there, nor was his grandmother. And thankfully there wasn't a single military policeman.

She had changed too. Thirteen years old, officially a teenager. But she felt more grown up than even that. She'd always been self-sufficient, but for the last two years, while Big Bob and Miriam both worked, she'd been managing certain aspects of their household: doing the shopping after school, figuring out their rations, carting in papers and other materials for the salvage drives, keeping track of their budget.

Helga glanced nervously at her watch. Almost quarter to five. The bus was supposed to arrive at four-thirty. She began to pace, stopping every few seconds and craning her neck to check for signs of the bus coming from the direction of the highway.

Phoebe was probably different now too. How could she not have changed? She'd been away for over two years, forced to live in harsher conditions than Helga could possibly imagine. In addition, there were farther-reaching issues like race, which Helga examined in solitary moments with great trepidation and shame, thinking again with remorse of Bob's rants and her own initial unclear, mixed motivations for offering friendship to her Japanese classmate.

Feeling a surge of panic Helga withdrew Phoebe's letter from the pocket of her red coat and reread it, confirming that she hadn't come on the wrong day or at the wrong time or to the wrong spot. That she could still hear Phoebe's voice in the writing; that she still sounded like her best friend.

Returning would probably be difficult for Phoebe and her family. Aunt Midori had lined up a job already. But they couldn't afford to buy back their house, which someone had bought for a fraction of its worth a few weeks after they'd been transported to the temporary camp. Arnold's grandparents had prepared a large room in their boarding house for Phoebe and her aunt, so at least they had a place to go, but it wasn't a home of their own anymore.

_Aunt Midori took a job at the shoe factory in the iron district,_ Phoebe had written. _Soon she'll be making Nancy Spumoni boots!_

Helga still had Phoebe's favorite painting by Yuko Heyerdahl stashed in her closet. Maybe it wouldn't be much but she was looking forward to returning it to her and seeing her joy.

David Heyerdahl wouldn't be coming back with Phoebe and Aunt Midori. Like many of the men in the camps he joined the fight for America so he wouldn't be seen as an enemy or a traitor. He was going to fight with the 442nd Battalion.

A heavy low-pitched rumble in the distance made her look up and she squinted at the oncoming traffic. The bus was a few blocks away still but she could see the top part of it looming over the cars in front. Helga tucked the letter back into her coat pocket. Her stomach was fluttering as she eagerly and apprehensively waited for the Greyhound to approach.

As it pulled up alongside the curb Helga thought she glimpsed Phoebe's large round glasses in one of the windows toward the front and a sob caught in her throat. She raised her hand tentatively and waved. When the window cracked open and Phoebe cried out her name she nearly burst into tears of relief.

There was a flurry of activity inside as the passengers stood and grabbed their belongings, preparing to disembark. The door opened and with a smile Helga stepped forward to welcome her friend home.


End file.
